Tag: blogging tips

More than ever before, businesses and marketers are turning to a marketing approach that, unlike traditional brand and direct marketing strategies, encourages consumers to regularly interact and participate with a business. Engagement marketing is based on the idea that consumers should be active participants in the business and its marketing strategies. From social media to email campaigns, the Web has provided multiple venues for marketers to engage their audiences with valuable content, two-way conversations, multimedia and lead-generating calls to action.

Engagement marketing is all about strengthening relationships between businesses and consumers. For years, consumers could only watch a television commercial or glance at a print advertising product without any real interaction on their part. While these traditional marketing methods can still be effective, one-way communication fails to provide a way for customers to effortlessly respond and interact with the company. The mission of engagement marketing is to encourage a two-way conversation with customers through new venues like social media sites, blogs and email campaigns. Since customer relationships are the core of any business’ success, any organization will benefit from incorporating the following engagement marketing methods into their business strategy.

Social Media — Social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter are ideal for engagement marketers because they provide ways for brands to create a two-way dialogue between businesses and consumers. This communication can also take place faster than ever before with the accessibility of social media on smart phones, iPads, laptops and desktop computers. For those who are new to the idea of engagement marketing, it’s best to begin by developing a presence on social media. Before you post anything, you must be in sync with your target audience and what they are looking for. It’s essential to be able to confidently answer the question, “What content is most valuable to my audience?” This could be anything from an article on a problem that your business solves to a photo that your audience would find interesting. Another tip is to run social media contests to promote engagement, attract fans and keep your audience engaged and entertained. Give social media followers a reason to look forward to seeing your business’ posts pop up in their newsfeeds.

Blogs — A blog is only as effective as the content it contains. Like social media, when developing a blog, it’s essential to put yourself in the consumer’s mindset to determine what content would be most valuable to them. Depending on your industry, create articles that provide solutions to the needs or problems that your customers face. While it’s fine to include information on your business, avoid self-promotion. Consumers are far more receptive to valuable, interesting content than straight sales pitches. For more information on blogging, read our articles, “Should My Business Have a Blog?” and “5 Blogging Mistakes and How to Fix Them.”

Email Campaigns — Targeted email marketing campaigns can successfully build engagement, build brand awareness and nurture leads. By creating punchy, interesting taglines, strong content and engaging graphics, your emails should look professional and appealing to readers. It’s best to include a variety of content since everyone takes in information differently. For example, include an article, photos and a brief call to action that encourages readers to get in touch with you. If someone replies to an email, it means that they have demonstrated an interest in your company or services. Make it a top priority to contact them within one day, at the latest, or you could miss out on a potential customer or client.

By nurturing interactive relationships with customers and providing them with valuable content that they will look forward to reading, your business can increase brand loyalty and customer engagement. Not only will you be able to strengthen relationships with existing customers but these customers will be far more likely to talk about your business, share your content online and recommend it to their friends and family.

The popular link-shortening service Bitly recently released a study determining the best times to post on various social networking services, based on their real-time link tracking data. They based this study on click-through rates, virality of posts and sharing rates that occurred at different times of the day (Eastern Time) and different days of the week. As this study supports, the time or day that you post something can have a significant impact on who views it, how much it gets shared and how many times it gets viewed. This article will provide readers with a guide of the best times to post on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and blogs.

Facebook — The main thing to remember about Facebook is to avoid posting on weekends, starting on Friday afternoons. According to Bitly, the highest average click-through rates for posts containing links on Facebook are between 1:00 p.m. and 4:00 p.m. on weekdays. More specifically, posts on Wednesdays have shown to be most effective.

Twitter — Similar to Facebook, it’s best to avoid tweeting on weekends if you want to secure as many click-throughs and shares as you can. The best time to post on Twitter is between 9:00 a.m. and 3:00 p.m., Monday through Thursday, since these are peak traffic times. Like Facebook, it’s ineffective to tweet at night, specifically after 9:00 p.m., on any day, and after 3:00 p.m. on Fridays.

Tumblr — Unlike Facebook and Twitter, Tumblr users seem to be on an entirely different schedule. Bitly found that on Tumblr, posts sent between 7:00 p.m. and 10:00 p.m. on Fridays, Sundays, Mondays and Tuesdays received the most clicks and shares among users.

Blogs — According to Shareaholic, the leading global social share widget, the most sharing of blog entries takes place on Thursdays with 10% more shares than any other day. If you’re looking for page views, the best days to blog are Mondays and Tuesdays. As for the best time of day to blog, various sources have found that the best time to update your blog is during the morning or early afternoon on weekdays.

Of course, it’s impossible to make sure you’re at your computer desk to post at these exact times. This is where social media publishing tools come in. By using programs such asHootSuite, Tweetdeck or Social Oomph to update social media profiles, you can schedule posts in advance and make sure they’re updated at the exact times you prefer them to appear. You can also schedule blog posts to automatically publish themselves at any time in the future on WordPress, Blogger and other popular blogging platforms. For more information on these helpful programs, refer to our article, “Social Media Publishing 101.”